CyberMDX Releases Healthcare Security Factbook

New York-based cybersecurity provider CyberMDX announces the release of the company’s inaugural Healthcare CIO Factbook. Drawing on data from 30-plus clinical facilities and more than 300,000 medical devices, CyberMDX conducted original industry research and compiled a resource to help hospitals drill down into their greatest technology and cybersecurity challenges.

With one-third of all U.S. data breaches perpetrated against hospitals, healthcare is already the most cyber-targeted sector of the economy and the problem is only getting worse. 2018 saw the number of breached medical records reach a then-record 15,085,302, tripling year-over-year from 2017. The uptick in data breaches has continued into 2019, with that figure having more than doubled—reaching nearly 32 million breached records—in the first half of the year alone.

In addition to the examination of hospital data, the report also includes the findings of a survey of healthcare executives, IT professionals, and biomedical experts from medical centers across the United States.

Some of the key takeaways from the survey include:

The three greatest challenges to security, as voted by participants were preventing cyberattacks, profiling and segmenting network traffic, and tracking endpoint visibility.

25% of hospitals do not keep an accounting of their medical/connected devices

32% of hospitals do not monitor for known or discovered vulnerabilities at all, while a further 30% only conduct such reviews on a yearly basis

36% of hospitals have no official policy regarding BYOD, or “bringing your own device.”

“Understanding what the issues are is the first step toward addressing them,” says Jon Rabinowitz, vice president of marketing at CyberMDX. “Collecting the information enables us to better understand the difficulties hospitals face in detecting and securing their medical devices and networks, ultimately helping our teams create improved solutions to meet their needs.”